Common Core State Standard
What is CCSS?
- Missions Statement -
The Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy. -Common Core State Standards Initiative (UCCSS, 2015, para.3)
- Implementation -
The Common Core State Standards are a clear set of shared goals and expectations for the knowledge and skills students need in English language arts and mathematics at each grade level so they can be prepared to succeed in college, career, and life. The standards establish what students need to learn, but they do not dictate how teachers should teach. Teachers will devise their own lesson plans and curriculum, and tailor their instruction to the individual needs of the students in their classrooms. (AtS, 2015, para. 7)
Still Unsure? Watch this video.
- Few of the Standards -
English Language Arts
-- Grade 1
Retell stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message or lesson.
-- Grade 6
Determine a theme or central idea of a text and how it is conveyed through particular details; provide a summary of the text distinct from personal opinions or judgments.
-- Grade 11-12
Determine two or more themes or central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to produce a complex account; provide an objective summary of the text.
Mathematics
-- Grade 1
Solve word problems that call for addition of three whole numbers whose sum is less than or equal to 20, e.g., by using objects, drawings, and equations with a symbol for the unknown number to represent the problem.
-- Grade 6
Understand the concept of a unit rate a/b associated with a ratio a:b with b ≠ 0, and use rate language in the context of a ratio relationship. For example, "This recipe has a ratio of 3 cups of flour to 4 cups of sugar, so there is 3/4 cup of flour for each cup of sugar." "We paid $75 for 15 hamburgers, which is a rate of $5 per hamburger,"1
-- High School Geometry
Derive the equation of a parabola given a focus and directrix.
All standards came from: (ELAS, 2015) & (MS, 2015)
* This is pertaining to the new math tactics.
- International -
The CCSS reflect an understanding among American educators that the highest performing countries create high, consistent expectations for student learning. Moreover, wide discrepancies in state standards are seen as one of the reasons that the United States is not as competitive as it once was on international tests. (Singmaster & Jackson, 2015, para. 7)
- The Good & The Bad -
Good
- Mutually agreed-upon standards that of skills and knowledge that students can achieve
- Teachers nationwide can collaborate and share ideas to better teach their students with the one main goal in mind
- Students will be better prepared for college and the workforce
- Common core is internationally benchmarked, so our students will be able to compete worldwide with other nations in their test scores
- The common core will cover many skills at once, which will lead to better problem-solving skills
Bad
Here are a few videos to take a look at.
Standardization kills creativity
*I also recommend looking at these sites: Common Core: The Good, the Bad, the Possible and CCSS: Pros & Cons
- My personal opinion -
Before writing this blog I did not know what CCSS was. I now have a clearer understanding of what CCSS is and my own view of it.
My view is purely from an outsider's vantage point because I have not seen it in effect in the US since I have been living in S. Korea the past 3 1/2 years.
My likes:
- I do like that a student that has moved from small town Iowa to big city Chicago can still be withing the same core standards.
- I like that with the proper training teachers could really help raise their students to a national standard
- I also like that this could have potential to raise the international view of US education
My dislikes: (I dislike this more than I like it)
- Testing.
- Standardized testing doesn't always tell the true progression of a student's intelligence.
- By focusing on testing and standardizing, you are taking more of the creativity out of education.
- CCSS is making the education process, in my opinion, one dimensional and geared toward testing.
- The US (I feel) is implementing this more in order to compete with the Asian countries.
- As a teacher in Korea, I am avidly against this! Many of the Asian countries just teach the test. The students aren't truly learning, they are just memorizing test answers.
- In addition, the students here have no life! They wake up, go to school at 8am, finish at 3pm and then go to a private academy until 8-10 at night! These children aren't being raised as children, they are drones.
- Citation -
About the Standards / Frequently Asked Questions / Overview. (2015). Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://www.corestandards.org/about-the-standards/frequently-asked-questions/
English Language Arts Standards. (2015). Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/
Mathematics Standards. (2015). Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://www.corestandards.org/Math/
Singmaster, H., & Jackson, A. (2015). The Global Roots of the Common Core State Standards. Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://asiasociety.org/education/global-roots-common-core-state-standards
Understanding the Common Core State Standards Initiative. (2015). Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://commoncore.pearsoned.com/index.cfm?locator=PS11Ue
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